The Janitorial Mafia

[NobleCarpetCleaners]

finally got hired to clean one of my customers. Got a call today from the maintenance guy who hires me. So here's what the competition does.

First, I clean this many sq/ft com. glue down school for challenged children with vacuuming and then truck mount at .20-25 per sq. Most of my invoices are at .25. Challenging place to clean. Tons of top soil, drinks, urine, other.

Today the hardworking maintenance guy calls me to say upper management went around him and hired a national company who cleaned all the carpet and the tile in the bathrooms for a grand total of $1200. The lead guy told him the carpet was priced at .12 per sq. I think the tile was thrown in; had to have been.

My guy told me they used the old school pile lifter, followed by cold water portables, followed by Cimex machines with what they said was encap. 3 guys plus a lead running cover for the crew. Took just one day.

When asked if this was their regular price he said oh no, but they are slow and know how to keep busy. The carpets "looked" good even after they dried, which took forever. However my guy says it wicks with the slightest moisture.

He called me to clean in a week a trouble room and to tell what just happened. Don't know if management will continue to bypass him for large cleanings, don't care. I clean the way I clean and get paid for what I do; clean, dries fast, no wicking.

Heard for a long time what the Mafia does and how they do it. Now I know first hand. They travel around hacking the jobs that their management keeps feeding them. Can you imagine what's done on a more wide scale nationwide?

 

[Desk Jockey]

.12 is good, they asked us to work for .07. Fooking middle man is nuts!

 

[hogjowl]

They did a lot for 12 cents a foot.

 

[Shane Deubell]

How many sqr ft? did you have to move all that furniture?

Sounds like something i would do BUT skip the portable part.
Actually for .12 vacuum and cimex sounds like a dam good job.

Sign me up!

 

[hogjowl]

I don't understand the order in which he says they did things.

 

[Steve Lawrence]

Man those prices are from the 70's.

 

[JS41035]

And they will keep going down. Those national service companies are driving down the prices. I get requests all the time from them to sub contract clean for them. Usually it's for a client I used to take care of. Only at half the price. I just don't work for them. Even if the price was fair,which it never is, the best case scenario is that they then use my great work as a reference to take MORE of my commercial customers.
Even thought I despise them. They are clever. They never step foot on a job. They get there subs to pay for GL. They don't buy local biz licenses. As far as quality control, they get the overworked salaried mangers of the stores or restaurants to do it for them! Usually with a form that asks "was the carpet clean?was it dry?" Initial here and that's it. That's there QC.
With Cimexs becoming more and more popular crazy cheap SF prices are gonna stay. As long as facilities managers keep signing contracts with these service contractors.
I would love to here the IICRC come down hard on these guys. They are really hurting the industry that it claims to represent. But. It won't. No instead guys are still gonna show up with broken portables and cold water claiming to be working for a national company that is IICRC approved.
'Mafia' is the best way to describe them. They just want a lil cut. Then a little more.

 

[Desk Jockey]

The calls we get are for small jobs, never big ones. Usually small crap at the mall.

If it were at least big jobs we might be able to be productive enough to make a go of it.

 

[Shane Deubell]

Mainly you're talking about retail, gave up on that racket about 15 years ago.
We do have some regional chains but no national.

Plenty of CGD out there besides restaurants/retail.

 

[dealtimeman]

when we hear that it is for a national or even regional company we just pass.

most of the time you have to jum thru more hoops than you would if you were just doing it for your self at half of the price.

if you are starving or your cildren are starving then by all means do the work, but it should not be a succcess to measure by no means.

 

[thecleaningdude]

At one time I had a couple of janitorial accounts that were pretty good. Paid on time and I'd get the carpet cleaning add-ons. This was until one account went with a corporate cleaner that had made a deal to clean all of their locations nationwide. The other account was located at a property that was gobbled up in a major real estate transaction. The new landlord re-worked the maintenance and CAM to include janitorial for all tenants.

Sucked.

I like cleaning commercial. It's reasonably straight forward work, typically no stairs and with the right accounts it can be fairly consistent. With that said, it does seem to be a changing marketplace. First, there appears to be less and less carpet in newer properties and remodels. Restaurants would be a fantastic example (though I don't clean any). Virtually every new food place I visit is concrete as are most retail and medical. The remaining commercial facilities have entries and walkways that are some sort of hard surface with carpet being found primarily in offices.

Also, as confirmed to me by a longtime local rep, virtually every janitorial company in my area now offers carpet cleaning and many 'commercial' floor cleaners now do the same. Add to that the national cleaning mafias and the mega corporate Cintas and it's a bitter pill to swallow.

I don't mean to sound like a negative Nancy. There is still plenty of carpet out there. But every market is different and I think this one is a little different than most. Uber cheap labor, cleaners offering multi service options along with more and more regionally and nationally owned locations poses challenges for the little guy.

/rant

 

[dealtimeman]

If you are delivering an excellent end product at reasonable prices you should never be without work. Will it slow down at times? Yes but good work always and I mean always leads to repeats and referrals.

If you are starting out and need some of these national accounts to get your feet wet and some experience under your belt then by all means do it just do some rough calculations and make sure you make something on the deal and you are losing your arse on it.

 

[Shane Deubell]

The commercial market is no different then 10-15 years ago. I can copy/paste the exact same thread from CFC (ics floor forum) circa 2002 and it is same thread.

Re- define your definition of "commercial". Retail, restaurants and apartments was, is and will always be a rough racket.

Our estimates for the week.
1. Manufacturer
2. Senior housing
3.Food processor
4. Dental practice
5. Law firm